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PETALING JAYA: A deputy director of the Department of Immigration has been arrested by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) as riot police continued to capture people linked to an immigration union.
According to one source, the deputy director, who is based out of KLIA, and two other immigration officers were the last to be arrested as part of a major joint operation by MACC and the Department of Immigration called Ops Selat.
MACC is also seeking an extension of pretrial detention for 10 other suspects.
“They were taken to the Putrajaya Magistrates Court to obtain a preventive detention order,” said a source.
Two civilians who allowed their bank accounts to be used for the bribery transaction have been released on bail.
To date, 53 people have been arrested since November 16, including 33 immigration officers attached to KLIA, klia2 and Sultan Iskandar’s Customs, Immigration and Quarantine (BIS) building.
More than RM 800,000 in cash, 26 luxury cars and four high-powered motorcycles were seized.
When contacted, MACC’s director of investigations, Norazlan Mohd Razali, confirmed the arrests but declined to comment further.
It was previously reported that the union catered to employers of foreign workers who wanted them to stay here or return to their country of origin.
The union had two modus operandi, the first was an “air passport” for those who came to Malaysia on social visas but worked here illegally.
Workers’ agents would collect their passports and pay immigration officers to stamp their passports to indicate that they had left the country after three months and re-entered legally.
His other modus operandi was to “set counters” for migrants who have been blacklisted for immigration crimes.
Migrants would go to these particular counters at airports and pay up to RM6,000 to be allowed to leave the country even though they had been blacklisted to travel.
